Zed

Zed’s native agent saves conversations locally. Hansard imports that history, including older editable text threads, and backs up local instructions.

Source IDs

Source	Use it for
zed	Native Zed Agent SQLite threads and historical text-thread JSON.

How the import works

Zed saves native threads in threads/threads.db beneath its data directory: ~/Library/Application Support/Zed on macOS, $XDG_DATA_HOME/zed (normally ~/.local/share/zed) on Linux, or %LOCALAPPDATA%/Zed on Windows. Hansard reads a consistent database snapshot, including committed WAL records, while Zed remains open. Compressed threads require Node.js with Zstandard support or the zstd command on PATH. Flatpak’s standard data directory is also checked.

The importer also reads native thread titles and workspace information from Zed’s sidebar database. Remote workspace paths stay recorded context and do not become local working directories. External ACP agents and terminal agents retain their own provider histories; sidebar entries alone are not imported as Zed conversations. Historical text threads come from conversations/*.zed.json beneath Zed’s configuration directory on macOS and its data directory elsewhere. Set HANSARD_ZED_ROOTS to a path-separated list of custom --user-data-dir roots; their configuration lives in each root’s config subdirectory.

Import and keep current

Conversation history

hansard import --source zed --since all

Enable Zed in Settings → Imports, or run:

hansard config sources enable zed

The watcher follows native databases and historical text files.

Memories and instructions

To back up instructions, run:

hansard memory backup

Backups include global AGENTS.md, the first matching project guidance file, and historical Rules Library records. Skill folders are not memories and are not backed up.

Review the import in the app

1. When the import finishes, open Conversations and selectFilter & sort.
2. Set Source to Zed and setTime to the window you imported. UseFolder to narrow the list when you use this harness in several projects.
3. Select a conversation to check its messages, tool calls, files, commits, model, and token usage.

To keep archiving new sessions from a local harness, openSettings → Imports. Automaticfollows every supported harness installed on this computer.Custom lets you turn individual harnesses on or off. Cloud sources and account exports never run from here; each needs its own import command. If a conversation you expect is missing after you reset the filters, run the import command on this page again with --explain-skips where the source supports it.

Open a native conversation to review prompts, thinking, tool results, and edit diffs. Select Zed in Stats to inspect cumulative token totals. Continue a saved conversation from Zed’s Threads Sidebar; Zed does not expose a native thread-resume CLI command.

What Hansard preserves

• Native text, thinking, images, file mentions, tool arguments and results, recorded edit diffs, errors, compaction summaries, and parent/child links.
• Cumulative input, output, cache-read, and cache-write usage when available.
• Recorded workspace and repository context, last model selection, profile, thinking settings, and drafts in source metadata.
• A consistent copy of the native thread database, matching sidebar row extracts, and exact historical text-thread files.
• Global AGENTS.md and first-matching project guidance through memory backup.
• Historical Rules Library records when the LMDB mdb_dump utility is on PATH. These records are read-only in Hansard.

Known limitations

Native threads save only the last selected model, so their cumulative tokens remain unattributed and unpriced. The saved model is retained as metadata; it cannot establish which model generated earlier requests. Request token usage is a context-size gauge and is excluded from accounting totals.

Native messages lack individual wall clocks. Start time uses the earliest available project snapshot or first-save time; older databases may only have last-update time. Historical text threads preserve editable message boundaries but no measured usage, tool execution records, repository identity, or reliable message times. Their logical clocks are not dates. No token estimate is added.

External agents, shared thread links, credentials, settings, diagnostic logs, editor state, and unsaved in-memory content are outside this source. Unknown native record types remain in raw history and are counted in session metadata. If the historical Rules Library exists but mdb_dump is unavailable, memory backup reports the missing utility and continues backing up file instructions.

Refresh an existing archive

hansard import --source zed --since all

Unchanged threads are skipped. Continued threads update their existing archive identity; changing another row in the same database does not reimport them. No other provider needs a reimport.